Match Me if You Can (33 page)

Molly uncrossed her legs and rose. “We do know, and we’ve been ordered to keep our mouths shut. Annabelle wants time to herself.”

“She just thinks she does. I have to talk to her.”

Gwen regarded him over her enormous stomach like a hostile Buddha. “Are you planning to give her more reasons she should marry a man who doesn’t love her?”

“It’s not like that.” He gritted his teeth. “I do love her. I love her with all my frickin’ heart, but I can’t convince her of that if somebody won’t tell me where the hell she’s gone.”

He hadn’t meant to sound so angry, and Charmaine took offense. “When did you have this miraculous realization?”

“Last night. A blue woman and a bottle of scotch opened my eyes. Now where is she?”

“We’re not going to tell you,” said Krystal.

Janine glared at him. “If she calls, we’ll relay your message. And we’ll also tell her we don’t like your attitude.”

“I’ll relay my own damned message,” he retorted.

“Not even the great Heath Champion can bulldoze his way through this.” Molly’s quiet stubbornness sent a chill up his spine. “Annabelle will contact you in her own way and in her own time. Or maybe not. That’s up to her. I know it goes against your nature, but you’ll have to be patient. She’s calling the shots now.”

“It’s not as though you won’t be busy,” Lady Evil drawled from behind him. “Now that Dean has turned his back on the goodwill of the woman who holds his contract—”

He spun on her. “I don’t give a damn about Dean right now, Phoebe, and here’s a news flash. Some things in life are more important than football.”

Her eyebrows rose ever so slightly. He turned back to the women, ready to strangle the information out of them if he needed to, only to discover he had no anger left. He lifted his hands, shocked to see they were unsteady, but not as unsteady as his voice. “She’s…I—I have to make this right. I can’t stand knowing she’s…That I’ve made her suffer. Please…”

But they had no hearts, and one by one, they looked away.

He walked blindly out of the house. The wind had picked up, and a blast of chilly air cut through his jacket. Mechanically, he reached for his phone, hoping against hope that she’d called, knowing she hadn’t.

The Chiefs were trying to reach him. So were Bodie and Phil Tyree. He set the heels of his hands on the hood of his car and bowed his head. He deserved to suffer. She didn’t.

“Are you sad, Pwince?”

He looked back toward the house to see Pippi standing on the top step of the porch, a monkey under one arm, a bear under the other. He fought a wild urge to pick her up and carry her around for a while, to tuck her under his chin and hold her close, just like one of those stuffed animals. He drew in a little air. “Yeah, Pip. I’m kind of sad.”

“You gonna cry?”

He pushed his response around the lump in his throat. “Naw, guys don’t cry.”

The door behind her opened, and Phoebe emerged, blond, powerful, and merciless. She paid no attention to him. Instead, she crouched at Pippi’s side and adjusted one of her pigtail stubs, speaking softly to her. He reached in his pocket for his keys.

Phoebe headed back into the house. Pippi dropped her stuffed animals and scampered down the steps. “Pwince! I gotta tell you something.” She ran toward him, pink sneakers flying. When she reached his side, she tilted her head back to gaze up at him. “I gotta secret.”

He crouched next to her. She smelled innocent. Like crayons and fruit juice. “Yeah?”

“Aunt Phoebe said don’t tell nobody but you, not even Mommy.”

He glanced toward the porch, but Phoebe had disappeared. “Tell me what?”

“Belle!” Pippi grinned. “She went to our campground!”

A surge of adrenaline shot through his veins. His head reeled. He pulled Pippi off her feet, drew her against him, and kissed the hell out of her cheeks. “Thanks, sweetheart. Thanks for telling me.”

She cupped his jaw and pushed him away with a frown. “Scratchy.”

He laughed, gave her another kiss for good measure, and set her back on her feet. He’d forgotten to turn his phone off, and it rang. Her eyes widened. He automatically reached for it. “Champion.”

“Heathcliff, I need an agent, man,” Dean barked, “and I swear to God, if you hang up on me again—”

He thrust his phone to Pippi. “Talk to the nice man, sweetheart. Tell him all about how your daddy’s the greatest quarterback who’ll ever play the game.”

As he pulled out of the driveway, he watched Pippi heading back to the porch, his phone pressed to her ear, her pigtails twitching while she chatted away for all she was worth.

Inside the house, the front draperies moved, and through the window, he glimpsed the most powerful woman in the NFL. Maybe it was his imagination, but it looked like she was smiling.

H
eath reached the Wind Lake Campground a little before midnight. Only the watery glow of the Victorian streetlamps on the commons and the single porch light at the bed-and-breakfast shone through the rain-swept darkness. His wiper blades beat at the Audi’s windshield. The unheated cottages sat empty and shuttered for the season. Even the caged yellow dock lights in the distance had been turned off. He’d originally planned to fly, but foul weather had closed the small airport, and he hadn’t been patient enough to wait out the delay. He should have, because the storm had stretched the eight-hour trip to ten.

He’d gotten a late start leaving Chicago. Not having Annabelle’s engagement ring in his pocket bothered him—he wanted to give her something tangible—so he’d driven back to Wicker Park to pick up her new car. Maybe she couldn’t wear it on her finger, but at least she’d see how serious he was. Unfortunately, the Audi Roadster hadn’t been built for a six-footer, and after ten hours, he had stiff legs, a cramped neck, and a killer headache he’d been feeding with black coffee. Ten Disney balloons bobbed in the backseat. He’d seen them tied together when he’d stopped for gas and impulsively bought them. For the last sixty miles, Dumbo and Cruella De Vil had been slapping the back of his head.

Through the rain-drenched windshield, he made out a row of empty rocking chairs swaying on the front porch. Even though the cottages were closed up, Kevin had told him the B&B did a decent business this time of year with tourists searching for fall foliage, and the Roadster’s headlights picked out half a dozen cars parked off to the side. But Annabelle’s Crown Vic wasn’t one of them.

The Audi lurched in a rain-filled pothole as Heath turned into the lane that ran parallel to the dark lake. Not for the first time did it occur to him that setting off for the north woods based on information fed to a three-year-old from a woman who held a giant grudge against him might not have been his smartest move, but he’d done it anyway.

He hit the brakes as his headlights picked out what he’d spent the last ten hours praying to see: Annabelle’s car, parked in front of Lilies of the Field. Relief made him light-headed. As he pulled up behind the Crown Vic, he gazed through the rain at the darkened cottage and fought the urge to wake her and set things straight. He was in no condition to negotiate his future happiness until he’d had a few hours’ sleep. The B&B was closed up for the night, and he couldn’t stay in town, not when Annabelle might decide to take off before he got back. Only one thing to do…

He backed the Audi around until it blocked the lane. Once he was satisfied she couldn’t get out, he turned off the ignition, shoved Daffy Duck out of his way, and tilted the seat all the way back. But despite his exhaustion, he didn’t immediately drift off to sleep. Too many voices from the past. Too many reminders of all the ways love had kicked him in the teeth…every damn time.

T
he cold awakened Annabelle even before her alarm, which she’d set for six. During the night, the temperature had dropped, and the blanket she’d pulled over herself couldn’t ward off the morning chill. Molly had told her to stay in the Tuckers’ private quarters at the B&B instead of an unheated cottage, but Annabelle had wanted the solitude of Lilies of the Field. Now she regretted it.

The hot water had been turned off last week, and she splashed cold on her face. After she helped serve breakfast to the guests, she’d treat herself to a long soak in Molly’s tub. Yesterday, she’d volunteered to help with breakfast when the girl who usually worked the morning shift had fallen ill. A small but welcome distraction.

She gazed at the hollow-eyed face in the mirror. Pitiful. But every tear she shed here at the campground was a tear she wouldn’t have to shed when she got back to the city. This was her time to mourn. She didn’t intend to make a career out of being miserable, but she wouldn’t beat herself up for hiding out, either. She’d fallen in love with a man who was incapable of loving her back. If a woman couldn’t cry about that, she didn’t have a heart.

Turning away, she snagged her hair into a ponytail, then slipped into jeans and sneakers, along with the warm sweater she’d borrowed from Molly’s closet. She let herself out through the back door. The storm had finally blown off, and her breath made frosty clouds in the cold, clean air as she walked down the path to the lake. The soggy carpet of leaves sucked at her sneakers, and the trees dripped on her head, but seeing the lake in the early morning lifted her spirits, and she didn’t care if she got wet.

Coming up here had been a good decision. Heath was a powerful salesman, and he saw every obstacle as a challenge. He’d be gunning for her when she got back, trying to convince her she should be satisfied with the place he wanted to relegate her to in his life—behind his clients and his meetings, his phone calls and his grueling ambition. She couldn’t return until she had all her defenses firmly in place.

Fingers of mist rose from the water, and a pair of snow-white egrets fed near the bank. Through the weight of her sadness, she struggled to find a few moments of peace. Five months ago, she might have settled for Heath’s emotional leftovers, but not now. Now, she knew she deserved better. For the first time in her life, she had a clear vision of who she was and what she wanted from her life. She was proud of everything she’d accomplished with Perfect for You, proud of building something good. But she was even more proud of herself for refusing to accept second best from Heath. She deserved to love openly and joyously—no holds barred—and to be loved the same way in return. With Heath, that wouldn’t be possible. As she turned away from the lake, she knew she’d done the right thing. For now, that was her only comfort.

When she reached the B&B, she pitched in to help. As the guests began filling the dining room, she poured coffee, fetched baskets of warm muffins, replenished the serving dishes on the sideboard, and even managed to crack a joke. By nine o’clock, the dining room had emptied out, and she set off back toward the cottage. Before she took her bath, she’d make her business calls. A master executive had taught her the value of personal contact, and she had clients who depended on her.

Ironic how much she’d learned from Heath, including the importance of following her own vision instead of someone else’s. Perfect for You would never make her rich, but bringing people together was what she’d been born to do. All kinds of people. Not just the beautiful and accomplished, but the awkward and insecure, the hapless and obtuse. And not only the young. Unprofitable or not, she could never abandon her seniors. Being a matchmaker was messy, unpredictable, and demanding, but she loved it.

She reached the deserted beach and paused for a moment. Pulling her sweater closer, she walked out onto the dock. The lake was quiet without its summer visitors, and the memories of the night she and Heath had danced in the sand washed over her. She sat down at the end and drew her knees to her chest. Twice she’d fallen for damaged men. But not ever again.

Footsteps sounded on the dock behind her. One of the guests. She pressed her wet cheek to her knee, blotting her tears.

“Hello, sweetheart.”

Her head came up, and her heart lurched. He’d found her. She should have known.

“I used your toothbrush,” he said from behind her. “I was going to use your razor until I figured out there wasn’t any hot water.” His voice sounded rusty, as if he hadn’t spoken for a while.

Slowly she turned. Her eyes widened in shock. He was mismatched, unkempt, and unshaven. Beneath a ratty red wind-breaker, he wore a faded orange T-shirt and navy slacks that looked as though he’d slept in them. He held a bunch of Disney balloons in his hand. Goofy had deflated and hung against his leg, but he didn’t seem to notice. Between the balloons and his dishevelment, he should have looked ridiculous. But with the polished veneer he’d worked so hard to obtain stripped away, she felt even more threatened.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” she heard herself say. “This is a waste of time.”

He cocked his head and gave her his huckster’s smile. “Hey, this is supposed to be like in
Jerry Maguire
. Remember? ‘You had me at hello.’”

“Skinny women are pushovers.”

His phony charm evaporated like the helium in the Goofy balloon. He shrugged, took a step closer. “My real name’s Harley. Harley D. Campione. Take a guess what the
D
stands for?”

He’d mow her down if she didn’t keep swinging. “Dumb ass?”

“It stands for Davidson. Harley Davidson Campione. How do you like that? My old man loved a good joke, as long as it wasn’t on him.”

She wouldn’t let him play on her sympathies. “Go away, Harley. We’ve both said everything we needed to.”

He stuffed his free hand in the pocket of his windbreaker. “I used to fall in love with his girlfriends. He was a good-looking guy, and he knew how to turn on the charm when he felt like it, so there was a whole slew of them. Every time he brought a new one home, I let myself believe she’d be the one who’d stick, that finally he’d settle down and act like a father. There was this one woman…Carol. She made noodles from scratch. Rolled the dough out with a pop bottle and let me cut it into these little strips. Best thing I ever tasted in my life. Another—her name was Erin—she’d drive me wherever I wanted to go. She forged his name on a permission slip so I could play Pop Warner football. When she left, I lost my ride, and I had to walk four miles to practice if nobody picked me up on the highway. That turned out to be a good thing, though. I ended up with a lot more endurance than the other guys. I wasn’t the strongest, and I wasn’t the fastest, but I never gave up, and that was a powerful life lesson.”

“Sometimes knowing when to give up is the real test of character.”

She might as well not have spoken. “Joyce, she taught me how to smoke and a few other things she shouldn’t have, but she had some problems, and I try not to hold it against her.”

“It’s too late for this.”

“The thing is…” He looked at the dock, not at her, and studied the boards at his feet. “Sooner or later, every one of those women I loved left. I don’t know. Maybe I wouldn’t be where I am today if one of them had stuck.” As he gazed back up at her, his old belligerence returned. “I learned early on that nobody was going to hand me anything. It made me tough.”

But no tougher than she was. She steeled herself and rose to her feet. “You deserved a better childhood, but I can’t change what happened. Those years shaped who you are. I can’t fix that. And I can’t fix you.”

“I don’t need to be fixed anymore. That job’s already been done. I love you, Annabelle.”

The pain was nearly more than she could bear. He was only saying what he knew she wanted to hear, and she didn’t believe him, not for a second. His words were carefully calculated, chosen for the sole purpose of closing a deal. “No, you really don’t,” she managed. “You just hate not getting your way.”

“It’s not that.”

“Winning is everything to you. The joy of the kill is your life’s blood.”

“Not when it comes to you.”

“Don’t do this! It’s cruel. You know who you are.” Her eyes filled with tears. “But I know who I am, too. I’m a woman who won’t settle for second place. I want the best,” she said softly. “And you’re not it.”

He looked as though she’d slapped him. Despite her own pain, she hadn’t wanted to hurt him, but one of them needed to speak the truth. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I won’t spend my life waiting around for your leftovers. This time persistence isn’t going to get the job done.”

He didn’t try to stop her as she left the dock. When she reached the sand, she crisscrossed her sweater over her chest and hurried toward the woods, ordering herself not to look back. But as she stepped onto the path, she couldn’t help herself.

The dock stood empty. Everything still. The only movement came from a bunch of balloons drifting off into the bleak October sky.

I
t didn’t take her long to pack. A tear dripped on her hand as she zipped the suitcase. She was so sick of crying. She picked up the bag and made her way numbly out the front door. With each step she took, she reminded herself that she’d never give up who she was for anyone. She came to a dead stop. Especially not for a man who’d blocked in her car with a sporty silver Audi…

He’d done a good job of it. A giant oak kept her from moving forward, and the Audi prevented her from going in reverse. The temporary Illinois tags left no doubt whose work this was. She couldn’t bear another encounter with him, and she dragged her suitcase back inside the cottage, but she’d barely set it down before she heard tires on gravel. She went to the window, but it wasn’t Heath. Instead, she glimpsed a dark blue sports car coming to a stop behind the Audi. The woods extended just far enough to block her view of whichever guest had decided to explore the campground.

It was all too much. She sank down on the couch and buried her face in her hands. Why did he have to make everything harder?

Light footsteps tapped on the porch, too light to be Heath’s. She heard a knock. Dragging her feet, she rose, crossed the room, opened the door…and screamed. To her credit, it wasn’t a horror movie scream, more of a yelpy kind of gaspy thing.

“I know,” a familiar voice said. “I’ve had better days.”

Annabelle took an involuntary step backward. “You’re blue.”

“A cosmetic procedure. It’s beginning to peel. May I come in?”

Annabelle moved aside. Even without her blue face, which had begun to crack like a cheap alligator purse, Portia hardly looked her best. Her inky hair lay flat against her head, clean but not styled. Her white sweater had a fresh coffee stain on the front. She’d gained weight, and her jeans were a size too tight.

Portia took in the cottage. “Have you talked to Heath?”

“What are you doing here?”